FRIDAY, March 29, 2024
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Inmates to help build flood barriers around Bangkok

Inmates to help build flood barriers around Bangkok

Hundreds of prison inmates have been sent out to help exhausted state workers and soldiers build more flood barriers to protect the capital, a senior Corrections Department official said yesterday.

 

About 500 convicts from prisons in Bangkok and neighbouring provinces were recruited to help strengthen the city’s temporary dykes, said Thanis Sriyaphan, the department’s deputy directorgeneral.
He added that he would accompany about 300 prisoners today to help build barriers around Suvarnabhumi Airport because there is a severe shortage of manpower for the job. 
The official said only prisoners with “good or excellent” records and those who only had a few months left in their prison terms would be allowed out of their cells to do the job. He added that none of the inmates allowed out to help make sandbags had escaped or caused any problems in the past.
Despite the severe flooding near prisons in Pathum Thani and Nonthaburi, the Corrections Department has no plans to evacuate the inmates there, Thanis said, adding that none of the prison compounds were flooded. “Moving a large number of convicts out of prison is a big job.” 
He said large complexes such as Bang Kwang Central Prison in Nonthaburi, which was severely flooded in 1983, have efficient floodprevention systems.
 
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